Mineshaft Mayhem
by Angelustatt
Summary: Too much caffiene can never be a good thing. But nothing could have prepared Dean and Sam for what they'd find on this hunt.


_A/N: This was a complete labour of love. Just a goofy, silly little fic that has no other purpose than to make my best mate in the world laugh...and hopefully a few others too. Because I'm feeling the love for these boys and their goofiness. It's something we need to share more of. _

_Dedicated to Tara for always being there for me to make me smile. *HUGS* _

**xxxxxxXXXXXXXXXxxxxxxx**

**Prosperity, Arizona**

"You sure this is the place?" Dean eyed the run down mine shaft with a sceptical eye. It was one of those sights he expected to find in a an old western movie, complete with some crotchety old miner wearing a battered hat and pushing a wheel barrow.

"This is ground zero for the disappearances, Dean. You marked out the map with me, maybe your calculations were wrong?" Sam fought back a smile, knowing what his brother's reaction was likely to be.

"Wrong? Dude, I'm never wrong."

"Never…?" Sam lifted an eyebrow.

"Hardly ever." Dean corrected with a shrug of his shoulders. "Come on, sooner we get this done, the sooner you can buy me some of that pie from that diner in town."

"Are you ever giving up that obsession with that pie?"

"Sure! Right around the time you give up porn and those freaking pansy ass coffees you drink all the time."

Sam flipped a middle finger salute to his brother, narrowing his eyes at Dean's back as he followed his brother into the darkness. He was carrying a Maglite in one hand, his trusty shotgun resting on his arm as he walked. There was a nasty smell coming from the mine as they went in deeper. The scent of decay and death.

"See? What did I tell you, Sammy? No way is that smell normal. This is definitely the place."

"Hey, you were the one asking me if I was sure." Sam protested. God, his brother could be annoying sometimes. They'd been on the road for 3 days already following a lead from Bobby about this case, a dozen or so people all disappearing from their homes in the area. It had taken a little while to work out that this mineshaft was what had linked them all to each other. Which had led to even less sleep and copious amounts of caffeine being needed to research.

By the end of it, Sam had found it hard to stop his knee from bouncing and Dean had become absolutely locked on the idea that he needed blueberry pie from the local diner. In fact, Dean had been convinced that a piece of that pie was going to solve everything…at which point, Sam had realised that they'd both consumed enough coffee to keep Brazil's economy afloat for years and were verging on insanity.

Although there were times Sam was willing to believe that Dean had been insane for years and that he'd just chosen to ignore it. It couldn't possibly be normal to have your socks in the sink. Or to eat the things Dean was willing to put in his mouth. Or to have such a deep and meaningful relationship with a classic muscle car…even if the Impala was a sweet ride.

And don't even get Sam started on his brother's music collection and his refusal to join the twenty first century. One of these days Sam would convince him to put a freaking CD player in. Maybe even an Ipod jack.

Of course one of these days, Sam was likely to sprout wings and take flight…which was more likely than Dean ever changing anything.

"You know, maybe we should have gotten some of those old fashioned torches? Like they have in the movies. Flaming torches. That would be awesome." Dean grinned as he swung his own Maglite back and forth.

"I'm switching you to decaf, dude."

"Oh come on, you trying to tell me you wouldn't get a kick out of that? Mine shaft…burning torches…dude, it'd be like Indiana Jones." Dean's grin grew wider and more boyish as the idea really started to take hold in his mind. Oh yeah, how cool would that be? He already had the jacket…now he just needed a battered fedora to wear. "I mean…he had Short Round? I have Sasquatch…it's perfect."

"Ha, ha, ha," Sam retorted, finding the idea less appealing now that he was suddenly the punch line in Dean's joke. "You're an asshole…"

"But you love me anyway." Dean smirked at his brother in the darkness.

"You keep telling yourself that, Dean."

"Ohhhh…ouch, dude. That hurts." Dean's voice was thick with mock hurt.

"Something else is gonna hurt if you don't keep an eye on where you're going, smart ass." Sam gave his brother a gentle shove in the back.

Dean stopped at that moment, grunting as Sam slammed into the back of him, almost knocking them both to the ground.

"Dean, what the hell? You wanna give a little warning before you stop?"

"You always tailgate, dude?" Dean growled in return, shoving Sam away from him. He flashed his torch around them, indicating they'd reached a fork in the shaft. It went in two separate directions which left them with a dilemma. "So what now?"

"You wanna flip a coin? Decide with tunnel we take first?"

"We could split up?" Dean offered, already seeing his brother's reluctance at that idea in the dim torch light.

"Yeah, cause that always works well, Dean. What if something happens to one of us?" Sam was in no mood to need to save Dean's ass or to have Dean risk his neck for him if something jumped them in the dark. Not when they had no idea at all of what might be hiding in this mineshaft.

"Aw come on, Sam. Nothing's gonna happen. You and I both know what this is likely to be, dude. The smell? Living in a cave? Dragging people from their basements into the mineshaft system beneath the town? It's gotta be a troll, Sam. We know how to handle a freaking troll." Dean couldn't believe Sam was going to suddenly get so precious. Okay, so they weren't one hundred percent sure it was a troll down here…Dean was sure enough for it to not worry him. They were smelly, slimy, fugly little suckers, but at only four feet tall? Dean had taken out more than his fair share of them over the years.

"What if there's more than one, Dean?"

Dean rolled his eyes this time. "Dude, are you kidding me? What's your problem here?"

"My problem? You, Dean. You're my problem. You're charging in like some caffeine fed Rambo on a one man mission to save the world from freaking cave trolls. Which we don't even know if it is a troll. Where are the skulls, Dean? There's no stench of urine to mark their territory…nothing." Sam argued, still not convinced.

"Only bridge trolls cock their legs on everything in sight, Sam. And there could still be skulls. Maybe this guy's gone in deep? I mean, this mine has to go for miles if it runs right under the town, right?" Dean suggested, flicking his torch down each shaft again. He was tense and coiled for action, his system complete buzzing with caffeine and adrenaline.

"I guess?" Sam ventured. He was really starting to dislike this idea. "I still don't see why we should split up though."

"Look, we'll cover more ground if we do, which means less time spent in this smelly ass cave…and more time in that diner having pie. It's a win-win situation, man. So get moving…unless you need me to hold your hand in the dark or something?"

"Bite me, Dean. I oughta let the troll eat you." Sam grumbled as he started down the right hand tunnel.

"Hey!"

"What?" Sam turned and looked back at Dean, catching him in the eyes deliberately with his torch.

Dean threw his arm up to shield his eyes. "You asshole! I was going to say, if you see Gimli? Give me a yell or something, okay?"

"Gimli?" Sam cocked his head to the side in confusion.

Dean was sure his brother was supposed to have the college brains, right? "You know? Gimli…short ass troll guy on Lord Of The Rings. The one that was in love with the freaking elf, dude!"

"That was a dwarf, Dean! Gimli's a dwarf! Did you even watch the freaking movie?" Sam was adopted…that was the only answer.

"Of course I did…most of it, anyway. It's not my fault those movies are so freaking long." Dean had meant to watch it all. But they'd been chasing a whole family of skin walkers for two days beforehand and it wasn't his fault the cinema was a nice, quiet place to sleep. A least it had been until Sam had elbowed him in the ribs for snoring. "Just yell if you see anything, okay?"

"Whatever." Sam turned and started down the tunnel again.

"Whatever.." Dean muttered mockingly under his breath as he stalked down the left hand tunnel. He'd find that freaking troll, blow his slimy freaking head off and carry it back so he could leave in Sam's bed like some sort of trollish underworld Godfather. Then he'd see who was so damn smug about freaking dwarves and elves and all that stupid crap. Although he'd never admit to Sam that he thought that Aragorn dude had totally kicked ass with a sword. Now there was a guy who knew how to make a entrance in a movie.

As he got deeper and deeper into the tunnel, Dean slowed down a little, picking up on the fact that the smell of decay was getting stronger now. He had to have picked the right tunnel. Wriggling his fingers slightly to loosen his grip on the pearl handled .45 in his hand, Dean was ready for whatever was in here.

His boots began to crunch, like he was walking on fortune cookies or something. What the hell? Dean paused and lowered his torch to sweep the floor. "Oh come on…that's just gross."

Bones.

The place was littered with bones. Not just human like Dean had expected from a troll lair, but animals of every description too. Nothing too recent by the looks of it…but there were enough bones to have Dean thinking this troll must have been hunting a lot more than human flesh before it starting snacking on town residents.

A strange chittering sound filled the air, making the hair on the back of Dean's neck stand on end. Okay…Trolls weren't known for chittering. What the hell was he dealing with? Lifting the torch, Dean felt his stomach back flip around the same time his heart tried to leap into his throat and escape out his mouth.

No less than thirty feet from Dean was the biggest damn spider he had ever seen. And by big? He meant freaking HUGE! It was the size of a small car…and it was staring straight at him with those eight beady eyes before it suddenly started to chitter with it's mandibles and took a few steps forward.

That was all Dean needed to see to have his feet moving backwards before his brain had given the signal to get the hell out of there. Werewolves, Wendigos…not a problem. Dean would face them down and take them out. But this?

No freaking way.

The torch flickered around the spider as Dean kept backing up and in the bright single beam, he caught sight of not just the one, but several of these spiders all advancing now. A whole damn nest of them it seemed.

That was when his survival instinct ignited in all it's glory and Dean screamed, fired off several shots at the nearest spider -- which seemed to scream itself and then kept advancing -- turned tail and ran for his life. His legs were pumping like pistons as he tried to see where the hell he was going by the dim light of his torch. A pot hole tripped Dean and he sprawled into the dirt, almost knocking the air from his lungs. But before the dust had even began to settle, he was up again and running. "Sam!! SAM!! Get the hell out of here!! NOW!"

Sam was already rushing back from his tunnel from the moment he heard the gunshots, never mind the high pitched terrified scream he'd heard from Dean. What the hell would make Dean react like that?

The brothers collided where the tunnels met up again, going down in a tangle of limbs that had them both groaning and coughing for air. Sam could taste blood, putting his thumb to his lip and finding it split. "Dean? What the hell? You found it?"

"F-forget the troll, Sammy, just haul ass, dude. Now!" Dean stumbled to his feet and reached for his brother, trying to pull Sam up make him move.

"What? Why?" Sam slapped Dean's hand away.

"Sam, will you just trust me on this? We have to go. We have to go now!"

"Trust you? No way, not til you tell me what the hell it is I'm running from, Dean." Sam got to his feet at last, dusting himself off.

"Spiders. Okay? Big ass spiders. You happy now? Now haul ass, Sam!" Dean demanded, already taking a few steps towards the mine exit.

"Spiders? Come on, Dean. You're telling me your afraid of some spiders?" Sam was already chuckling as he headed for the tunnel Dean had barrelled out of like a freight train. "They're just spiders, du--…."

The rest of what Sam was going to say, came to a screeching halt as his torch illuminated the sight of several giant spiders skittering along the tunnel towards them. His mind tried to rationalise what it was seeing…it really did. His mouth worked like a fish, opening and closing for a few heart beats before his brain officially declared it was done trying to find the logic in this situation and suggested to Sam that he get the hell out of Dodge.

Which he did. Without any hesitation.

His long lanky legs were eating up the tunnel as he snagged Dean's jacket on the way through and almost pulled his brother off his feet altogether before Dean found his footing and the pair of them ran for the exit.

The moment they hit the fresh, clean air outside the tunnel, Sam started vowing to never EVER go into a tunnel again. Ever. Unless he was armed with a cannon, maybe a small nuclear device.

Both Sam and Dean ran for the Impala. But as Sam ran around to the passenger door and yanked it open, expecting Dean to do the same on the other side…he was surprised and confused to see Dean run straight for the Impala's trunk instead. "Dean? What are you doing?"

"Those fugly sons of bitches have been eating people, Sam…and they scared the hell out of me. I'm taking them out."

"With what? Last time I looked? We didn't carry a can of bug spray big enough to kill those things!"

"Maybe not…" Dean acknowledged as he dug through the trunk, pushing aside guns, knives, boxes of ammo. He knew it was here somewhere. It damn well had to be. "Aha!! Alright…it's payback."

Walking back around the Impala, Dean hefted up the forty millimeter grenade launcher he had carried in the trunk since that day at their Dad's storage room. There was a triumphant, almost maniacal grin on his face as he levelled the grenade launcher towards the mine and let fire with several rounds as the first spider rushed out of the exit.

It exploded in a spray of green goo, bug guts and body parts as Dean let rip with a whooping cheer. The other shots he had fired off tore the opening of the mine apart and splattered the remaining spiders with the resulting cave in.

Once the dust had settled, Dean lowered the grenade launcher and turned to find Sam watching him, completely stunned by what he had just seen.

"And that right there, Sam? Is exactly why we have this baby in the trunk." The grin on Dean's face was the biggest Sam could ever recall seeing. "And you owe me some pie, bitch."

Sam couldn't help that laugh that shook him, leaving him giddy and breathless. "Fine, jerk. You done playing Rambo?"

"Rambo? No way, dude…that was all me." Dean's grin cranked up another notch as he turned and walked back to the Impala, dropping the launcher in the trunk again. He slammed the lid down then slid in behind the wheel of his beloved muscle car. Cranking up AC/DC's The Jack, Dean planted his foot and roared back to town as Sam rolled his eyes at his brother's antics.

Sam knew his brother was going to be impossible to live with for days.

Dean? Well Dean was pretty damn sure he would never be afraid of spiders again after that. Rats though? That was another story…..


End file.
